The soft racial bigotry of low expectation is a sickness from those having obtained some higher socioeconomic status while lacking significant bottom-up struggle.
It's hardly unusual for people who say they have high self-esteem for it to be conditional and insecure. Are there studies that take that into account?
I had never thought of Brown v... as an important inflection point, but that's really interesting. I think the "acting white" concept has some legitimacy in predominantly black spaces, but is often oversimplified as a concept. In my experience, high academic achievement alone didn't earn you that label. It was normally a combination of factors that earned you that label. Do you understand cultural references in music and pop (hip-hop and/or R&B) culture? It essentially comes down to a degree of relatability. I think there is also an adult version of this, but this crosses into class issues as well. I think out of necessity for decades, there wasn't as much class delineation on a daily basis in black communities and very much a monoculture when it came to arts and culture. I think that is changing somewhat along with perceptions of academic achievement and it's purpose, but there is plenty of progress to be made. Great read!
"The idea of differing foundations for self-esteem neatly explains the widely reported phenomenon among black teens that excelling in school is thought of as 'acting white.'"
I am white and so were all the others in the public schools I attended from kindergarten through high school, but in light of what I recall of my own mentality and what I could sense of the attitudes of other male students in my social set when I was a teenager I daresay that what black teenagers chiefly disdain is the behavior associated with getting high marks in school -- perfect or near-perfect class attendance, showing respect for teachers and otherwise maintaining proper decorum, paying rapt attention in class, diligent performance of homework and reading assignments, eagerly volunteering with raised hand to answer questions posed by teachers and giving the desired responses, etc. My pals and I disdained such behavior back in the day, but one student in my high-school class with whom I was closely acquainted managed to get top grades despite being a notoriously disruptive classroom "wise-guy," and I envied him for that.
Insofar as it deters after-class study, such disdain for docile conformity could have a substantial negative impact on performance on standardized tests of mathematic ability, but how it may affect reading comprehension scores is another matter.
The soft racial bigotry of low expectation is a sickness from those having obtained some higher socioeconomic status while lacking significant bottom-up struggle.
It's hardly unusual for people who say they have high self-esteem for it to be conditional and insecure. Are there studies that take that into account?
I had never thought of Brown v... as an important inflection point, but that's really interesting. I think the "acting white" concept has some legitimacy in predominantly black spaces, but is often oversimplified as a concept. In my experience, high academic achievement alone didn't earn you that label. It was normally a combination of factors that earned you that label. Do you understand cultural references in music and pop (hip-hop and/or R&B) culture? It essentially comes down to a degree of relatability. I think there is also an adult version of this, but this crosses into class issues as well. I think out of necessity for decades, there wasn't as much class delineation on a daily basis in black communities and very much a monoculture when it came to arts and culture. I think that is changing somewhat along with perceptions of academic achievement and it's purpose, but there is plenty of progress to be made. Great read!
John McWhorter is a necessary voice in the macro discussion of race.
Thank you for sharing this piece.
"The idea of differing foundations for self-esteem neatly explains the widely reported phenomenon among black teens that excelling in school is thought of as 'acting white.'"
I am white and so were all the others in the public schools I attended from kindergarten through high school, but in light of what I recall of my own mentality and what I could sense of the attitudes of other male students in my social set when I was a teenager I daresay that what black teenagers chiefly disdain is the behavior associated with getting high marks in school -- perfect or near-perfect class attendance, showing respect for teachers and otherwise maintaining proper decorum, paying rapt attention in class, diligent performance of homework and reading assignments, eagerly volunteering with raised hand to answer questions posed by teachers and giving the desired responses, etc. My pals and I disdained such behavior back in the day, but one student in my high-school class with whom I was closely acquainted managed to get top grades despite being a notoriously disruptive classroom "wise-guy," and I envied him for that.
Insofar as it deters after-class study, such disdain for docile conformity could have a substantial negative impact on performance on standardized tests of mathematic ability, but how it may affect reading comprehension scores is another matter.